Half an hour later, seven people waited in the central courtyard of the Qi residence—Wang Jacob and Liu Isaiah were among them.
Liu Isaiah lived up to his name—he was a burly man over seven feet tall.
"Why are there still two missing? I remember there were nine of us earlier," Liu Isaiah wondered.
Wang Jacob lowered his eyes and said in a low voice: "The ones who didn't come are probably already dead." If he hadn't mentioned Qi Oliver's appearance in time, his body would have gone cold by now. When it came to family interests, these clan leaders would kill their subordinates without hesitation, regardless of how "benevolent" they usually seemed.
Liu Isaiah's face stiffened, then he sighed: "I'm lucky I quickly said I'd defected to Master Qi; otherwise, I'd probably be dead too. This time, I finally see through Zhang Elias—it was really not worth it to work so hard for him before."
Wang Jacob forced a bitter smile and said nothing. The Lu family (Lu Mason) and Zhang family (Zhang Elias) were unrighteous, but would things be any better if he defected to Qi Oliver? All crows under the sun were black!
At that moment, Qi Oliver walked in through the circular gate.
"We pay our respects to Master Qi! We are willing to serve the Qi family from now on—please take us in!"
As soon as they saw Qi Oliver, everyone bowed respectfully and said in unison.
Qi Oliver smiled faintly: "You've offended the Spirit Martial Sect, and your masters want to silence you—your current situation is indeed difficult."
Everyone's faces twitched. They had ended up in this situation all because of Qi Oliver, but no one dared to say that at this moment.
"No matter what intentions you have in coming to the Qi family, I hope you understand that the only person who can save your lives now is me," Qi Oliver said, narrowing his eyes.
Wang Jacob cupped his hands: "We understand. As long as Master Qi is willing to take us in, Wang Jacob's life belongs to Master Qi from now on."
Qi Oliver smiled: "It seems that people really don't change until they go through some hardships."
Wang Jacob's face turned red. Half an hour ago, when Qi Oliver had recruited him, he had refused on the grounds of being loyal to the Lu family (Lu Mason); now, he was begging Qi Oliver to take him in.
"Then you can all stay. Jake (Anan), go arrange accommodation for them," Qi Oliver smiled and instructed the servant Jake beside him.
Jake quickly replied: "Yes, Master."
"Everyone, please follow me."
Wang Jacob and the others bowed to Qi Oliver and followed Jake away.
"Master, they're all from other clans—are you sure it's okay to take them in like this?" the servant Jack (Anbei) asked cautiously. Jake and Jack were brothers—Jake was fifteen and Jack was fourteen. Half a year ago, the village they lived in had been raided by martial bandits, and everyone in the village had been killed. Only the two brothers, who had gone into the mountains to collect herbs, had narrowly escaped. To bury their relatives and fellow villagers, they had sold themselves to the Meng family (Meng Christopher). Qi Oliver thought the two brothers were loyal and righteous, so he had kept them by his side.
Qi Oliver smiled faintly: "Even if there are problems, they won't be big ones. Their masters were unrighteous, and greed confuses people's hearts. When they realize they can get more from me than from their former masters, as long as they're not fools, they'll know where they should stand."
Jack scratched his head, not knowing if he understood. He just smiled awkwardly.
Wang Jacob and the others all had cultivation at or above the Martial Artist Realm Sixth Rank—such strength was above average in Yuan Spirit City. With a little guidance from him, it would not be difficult for them to reach the Master Realm. Most importantly, regardless of whether these people were truly loyal to him or not, they had killed a Spirit Martial Sect disciple and thus had no way back.
Wang Jacob and Liu Isaiah stayed at the Qi residence for two days without being summoned by Qi Oliver or assigned any tasks, which made them anxious. Although having no official duties was relaxing, living there for free meant they would not receive any resource allocation—and without resources, they could not improve their strength.
"Brother Wang (Wang Jacob), does Master not trust us? Should we go find him and pledge our loyalty again?" Liu Isaiah came to Wang Jacob's courtyard, wearing a worried expression.
Wang Jacob said in a low voice: "It's normal for Master not to trust us. Although he's young, he won't easily trust someone just based on verbal pledges of loyalty."
Liu Isaiah scratched his head vigorously: "Then what do we do? Just wait around like this?"
Wang Jacob nodded: "We'll wait for Master to assign tasks. When we get tasks, we'll do our best to complete them. Everything else depends on time."
Inside the room, Qi Oliver slowly opened his eyes. He had been meditating and cultivating for the past two days, and his cultivation had improved slightly.
"I've reached Grand Master Fourth Rank. It's a pity that the Spirit Stones are exhausted again. Who would have thought that An Theodore, as a Spirit Martial Sect outer sect elder, would only have 200,000 Spirit Stones in his storage ring—he's really poor."
Qi Oliver shook his head helplessly. Even with a peerless cultivation technique, it was still difficult to improve his cultivation rapidly without sufficient resources.
"Fortunately, Li Theodore and Qin Sebastian are on their way back."
Qi Oliver narrowed his eyes slightly. He planned to go to the Huang family (Huang Jackson, Huang Silas) once Li Theodore and Qin Sebastian returned. As long as he dealt with the Huang family, he would no longer have to worry about cultivation resources.
Qi Oliver got up and went to the warehouse, where several baskets were placed—each filled with Spirit Stones. Qi Oliver frowned: "Why is there so little Spirit Stone delivered? It seems someone has had dishonest thoughts!"
The Meng family (Meng Christopher) owned seven Spirit Mines in total. Three of them were old mines with low output, but the four new ones each produced more than 100,000 Spirit Stones per month. Thus, the seven mines should produce at least 10,000 Spirit Stones per day. But the total number of Spirit Stones in the baskets now was less than 10,000—and this was the output of five days!
"Daring to embezzle my Spirit Stones—they're courting death." Qi Oliver's eyes turned cold, and he transmitted his voice using spiritual power: "Wang Jacob, bring Liu Isaiah and the others to the main hall immediately!"
Wang Jacob was shocked. He quickly called Liu Isaiah and the others and rushed to the main hall.
"Please give us your orders, Master!" Wang Jacob said hastily.
Qi Oliver said coldly: "Someone in the Spirit Mines has been embezzling Spirit Stones. Now I order you to lead a team to investigate. You must recover the Spirit Stones and behead the embezzlers, then expose their bodies to warn others!"
"Yes!" Wang Jacob and the others immediately accepted the order. Wang Jacob, Liu Isaiah, and the others were ruthless people and had no connections with those in the Spirit Mines. Moreover, they were eager to prove themselves to gain Qi Oliver's trust—so this task would be done well.
Shortly after Wang Jacob and the others left, Li Theodore and Qin Sebastian returned to the mansion and excitedly went to find Qi Oliver to report.
"Master, we've made great gains these days based on the map you gave us!"
As soon as they met, Qin Sebastian said excitedly. The spiritual objects he now held were more than he had seen in his entire life! Although there were only 72 marked locations on the map, some of them had clusters of spiritual objects! As he spoke, Qin Sebastian respectfully handed a storage ring to Qi Oliver with both hands.